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Dec. 11th, 2021 11:58 pmToday was full of little adventures!
There was normal bellringing practice, that I thought I was going to be late for but arrived _just_ on time (by dint of catching both red and green lines with less than two minutes of waiting --a rare and pleasant occurrence). Practice was small, just five of us, and we decided to spend the last hour on a quarter peal attempt. Alas, it did not went, but we got about seventy percent of the way through, and it was lovely practice --mixed St. Nicholas, and Stedman, and Grandsire!
(I figured out a way to shift my weight pleasantly between the slow and quick sixes, which occurred to me as Something To Do when I realized I couldn't remember if singles kept parity or not (they do not). So I will probably try and continue to do that when I ring Stedman in the future, as it's useful to know.)
Post practice, Josh and Bee went off on their own adventures, but Austin and JohnB and I got some lunch and returned to the tower to eat it. Eating ~indoors~ what a marvelous rebellious thing to do! (extremely well spaced and with two of us in a pod already anyways) But it was wet and gross outside, and there was a wedding to ring later so we were gonna return eventually regardless.
The three of us decided we were going to a) check out the ice skating rink just downhill from Old North and b) kill ninety minutes before it opened. This meant we got to go ~shopping~, which was a brief stint through the Haymarket to see what random pop-up artisans were around, and then more or less an hour in Commonwealth Books when we spotted it down an alley and collectively went "antique books and maps?! :D"
Bookshop netted me a couple presents for Alys and one for Austin, which means I've probably successfully Christmassed for everyone I definitely need to do so for! Yay! In a perfect world, Bee's present would get here before Wednesday and also they'd both be at bells so I could give them both presents, muahaha. I still want to swing by a game store and get a thing for Al and possibly a thing for mum, and there's always extra stocking stuffers to obtain, but I am genuinely trying to make the wretched excess slightly less wretched this year.
That comfortably took us to free skate time, and we were very pleased to find the term quite literal! DCR rinks are literally free to skate, with a five dollar fee to rent ice skates if necessary. We did a cool half hour on the ice, with Austin mildly showing off, and John wobbling extensively (which was later revealed to be huge cracks in the rental skate and not his fault at all).
Then back to the church where we rang the bells up and lounged about and then Austin went off on other adventures and I greeted the other ringers and we had merry conversation until wedding ringing time! We rang some lovely rounds and called changes!
JohnB was calling, and he looked over at me (being tower captain means I'm in charge of things now? Weird.) to ask "should we go more or stand". As I was starting to answer, there was a tremendous thud from up above and I very quickly and firmly and loudly declared "stand next please" (being tower captain means I have the authority to interrupt common etiquette of who's in charge when it sounds like Something Bad Has Happened).
We all stood except Josh, who had lost the game of "oh fuck, whose clapper was that" and he carefully rang his bell down. He and I scurried up to the belfry to have a quick look around before we rang down the other bells --it wouldn't do to cause more damage if the clapper had thrown itself somewhere distressing. "Luckily" the clapper hadn't gone anywhere except the floor under the bell, and, er, very solidly onto the slider which was splintered roughly in half. Whoops. One bell fewer at service ringing tomorrow, it seems.
We rang the rest of the bells down quickly and steadily, then Josh and I returned upstairs, accompanied by JohnB, to take photos for our steeple keeper and investigate further. We also double checked all the other bells and found two more clapper pins and a staple bolt that could use tightening. Still though, there's some degree of "well this shouldn't be happening" so I look forward to learning more.
Also dang, this is the second time in my not-that-long ringing career that I've been in the room when a clapper popped, and I'm given to understand that's not that usual. At least I have still never broken a stay (knock wood).
At any rate, no one was hurt, and so the general mood was "annoyed but in an amused fashion" as we gathered ourselves up and headed home. Margaret and I got the longest stint together (nearly the whole of the red line from Park) where we had much merry discussion about the man who had a Phenomenally Loud bluetooth boombox blasting Oops I Did It Again and California Girls across the train car or station. I was able to get a good enough glimpse of the device to do my google fu and find out the exact brand, and it's very plausible I will be purchasing one of those myself.
Not because I want to be a jerk on the T --I have enough social know-how to not do _that_-- but because I was genuinely impressed by the volume and sound fidelity and that would be So Useful for me to have as a dance teacher, you have no idea.
And now I am back in Catlandia and have done many Chores --straightened up multiple rooms and washed some dishes and dealt with my clean laundry. And now Austin is here and we're going to shower and go to bed! I hope your weekend has been the right degree of adventuresome as well.
~Sor
MOOP!
There was normal bellringing practice, that I thought I was going to be late for but arrived _just_ on time (by dint of catching both red and green lines with less than two minutes of waiting --a rare and pleasant occurrence). Practice was small, just five of us, and we decided to spend the last hour on a quarter peal attempt. Alas, it did not went, but we got about seventy percent of the way through, and it was lovely practice --mixed St. Nicholas, and Stedman, and Grandsire!
(I figured out a way to shift my weight pleasantly between the slow and quick sixes, which occurred to me as Something To Do when I realized I couldn't remember if singles kept parity or not (they do not). So I will probably try and continue to do that when I ring Stedman in the future, as it's useful to know.)
Post practice, Josh and Bee went off on their own adventures, but Austin and JohnB and I got some lunch and returned to the tower to eat it. Eating ~indoors~ what a marvelous rebellious thing to do! (extremely well spaced and with two of us in a pod already anyways) But it was wet and gross outside, and there was a wedding to ring later so we were gonna return eventually regardless.
The three of us decided we were going to a) check out the ice skating rink just downhill from Old North and b) kill ninety minutes before it opened. This meant we got to go ~shopping~, which was a brief stint through the Haymarket to see what random pop-up artisans were around, and then more or less an hour in Commonwealth Books when we spotted it down an alley and collectively went "antique books and maps?! :D"
Bookshop netted me a couple presents for Alys and one for Austin, which means I've probably successfully Christmassed for everyone I definitely need to do so for! Yay! In a perfect world, Bee's present would get here before Wednesday and also they'd both be at bells so I could give them both presents, muahaha. I still want to swing by a game store and get a thing for Al and possibly a thing for mum, and there's always extra stocking stuffers to obtain, but I am genuinely trying to make the wretched excess slightly less wretched this year.
That comfortably took us to free skate time, and we were very pleased to find the term quite literal! DCR rinks are literally free to skate, with a five dollar fee to rent ice skates if necessary. We did a cool half hour on the ice, with Austin mildly showing off, and John wobbling extensively (which was later revealed to be huge cracks in the rental skate and not his fault at all).
Then back to the church where we rang the bells up and lounged about and then Austin went off on other adventures and I greeted the other ringers and we had merry conversation until wedding ringing time! We rang some lovely rounds and called changes!
JohnB was calling, and he looked over at me (being tower captain means I'm in charge of things now? Weird.) to ask "should we go more or stand". As I was starting to answer, there was a tremendous thud from up above and I very quickly and firmly and loudly declared "stand next please" (being tower captain means I have the authority to interrupt common etiquette of who's in charge when it sounds like Something Bad Has Happened).
We all stood except Josh, who had lost the game of "oh fuck, whose clapper was that" and he carefully rang his bell down. He and I scurried up to the belfry to have a quick look around before we rang down the other bells --it wouldn't do to cause more damage if the clapper had thrown itself somewhere distressing. "Luckily" the clapper hadn't gone anywhere except the floor under the bell, and, er, very solidly onto the slider which was splintered roughly in half. Whoops. One bell fewer at service ringing tomorrow, it seems.
We rang the rest of the bells down quickly and steadily, then Josh and I returned upstairs, accompanied by JohnB, to take photos for our steeple keeper and investigate further. We also double checked all the other bells and found two more clapper pins and a staple bolt that could use tightening. Still though, there's some degree of "well this shouldn't be happening" so I look forward to learning more.
Also dang, this is the second time in my not-that-long ringing career that I've been in the room when a clapper popped, and I'm given to understand that's not that usual. At least I have still never broken a stay (knock wood).
At any rate, no one was hurt, and so the general mood was "annoyed but in an amused fashion" as we gathered ourselves up and headed home. Margaret and I got the longest stint together (nearly the whole of the red line from Park) where we had much merry discussion about the man who had a Phenomenally Loud bluetooth boombox blasting Oops I Did It Again and California Girls across the train car or station. I was able to get a good enough glimpse of the device to do my google fu and find out the exact brand, and it's very plausible I will be purchasing one of those myself.
Not because I want to be a jerk on the T --I have enough social know-how to not do _that_-- but because I was genuinely impressed by the volume and sound fidelity and that would be So Useful for me to have as a dance teacher, you have no idea.
And now I am back in Catlandia and have done many Chores --straightened up multiple rooms and washed some dishes and dealt with my clean laundry. And now Austin is here and we're going to shower and go to bed! I hope your weekend has been the right degree of adventuresome as well.
~Sor
MOOP!